47 arrested in 15 provinces for importing, handling and selling medicines without sanitation controls

The operation took place in Madrid, Alicante. Gerona, Barcelona, Tarragona, Valencia, Almeria, Jaen, Granada, Seville, Malaga, Leon, Salamanca, Valladolid and the Canary Islands. They are being accused of public health offences, belonging to a criminal organisation, fraud, smuggling and money laundering.

The leader of this criminal organisation, the Spanish citizen A.D.G., was arrested in Dubai (United Arab Emirates), from where he ran the operation while on the run from three current international arrest warrants for various offences. The arrest was made possible thanks to some swift coordination between the Spanish Home Affairs Attaché Office and the UAE authorities, enabling his immediate extradition.

The investigation began more than a year ago following an anonymous tip-off from a member of the public. This led to various customs shipments coming from Malaysia that may have contained the active ingredients for medicines without being declared as such being tracked.

Tadalafil and Sildenafil as food supplements

Ministerio de HaciendaThis criminal organisation imported large volumes of drugs from Malaysia, always falsely declaring them as food supplements and natural plants to evade customs checks, for subsequent sale as 100% natural stimulants when, in actual fact and as demonstrated by various analyses, they were powerful drugs such as Tadalafil and Sildenafil, vasodilatory drugs used for the treatment of erectile dysfunction.

Ingesting these products without medical supervision can cause a heart attack, unstable angina, ventricular arrhythmia, palpitations, tachycardias, strokes and even sudden death.

In light of the results from these analyses, the Spanish Medicines Agency withdraw certain products declared as "natural" from the market, the content of which did not correspond to their composition, due to their highly dangerous nature for consumer health.

The leaders of this organisation, fully aware of the effects of these products because of complaints from customers and the constant withdrawals from the market by the Spanish Medicines and Healthcare Product Agency, simply changed the trading names and packaging to continue distributing and selling the products via an extensive network of establishments, such as health food shops, sex shops and gyms, as well as via the Internet. The goods seized are contained in 150 different packaging designs.

500,000 euros in cash and 59 websites seized

In total, this first stage of the operation involved action in 15 provinces, including 12 property searches and 55 business and warehouse inspections. This led to the seizure of more than 500,000 euros in cash, 39 current accounts (two of them overseas), seven high-end vehicles valued at over 300,000 euros and two firearms.

Similarly, 59 websites used for the sale of this type of product were blocked. The investigating officers discovered that products had been supplied to locations throughout Spain, as well as countries such as Portugal, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy and Russia.

Over 200,000 boxes or packs in various designs were also seized, all of them with names and slogans relating to 100% natural products, as well as 400,000 capsules of product pending analysis and various labelling machines.

Over 400 civil servants and officers

It is worth noting the close collaboration between investigating officers from the three police forces (National Police, Guardia Civil and Customs Surveillance Service of the Spanish Tax Office), finally involving more than 400 civil servants and officers from the three participating forces coordinated by the Criminal Investigation Court Nº 8 of Alicante.

Non official translation